


a crown of stars and scars

by notorious



Category: Legacies (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, but like ..... stupid royals, royal au, semi-graphic depictions of non-mortal wounds
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-12
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 21:07:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24682033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notorious/pseuds/notorious
Summary: When the assassin Penelope Park makes an unsuccessful attempt on Queen Elizabeth’s life she finds herself imprisoned and set to be executed before the commonwealth.The queen’s sister, Josette, despises the public executions Mystic Falls has come to know and love and decides to make it her mission to put a stop to this one.
Relationships: Penelope Park/Josie Saltzman
Comments: 39
Kudos: 155





	1. prologue

**Author's Note:**

> howdy. this is what i’ve been working on in-between a few other things that should’ve been finished ages ago. it may or may not be coherent. as always it is mostly unedited. enjoy!!!!

The kingdom of Mystic Falls was vast, but oh how it was bleak. Prairies stretched from the western forest line to the eastern, desert flats crowded the capital city from every which way but north, and a thick woodland inched along the northern border around to the east, lining the south right on down to the southern tip where the East and West Rivers met. The Queen’s Wall ran the northern length. The Old Border was the biggest divide; the kingdom was the shape of a triangle, from Chatham to Salem and right on up to Culpeper, and the Old Border sliced off the tip. Above it were the Badlands.

Now that we have our lay of the land…

In the beginning, a long while ago, there lived a king.

The brash King William of Mystic Falls, the first of his name.

In the end there was but one royal left, and only after the kingdom of Mystic Falls burned to the ground in a grand display of defeat. And the one that was left, you ask? The Queen Conqueror Penelope Park, the first and last of her name.

Now, to get to the end.

Shall we begin with ‘once upon a time,’ as these tales often do? Or would it suffice to say that it all began, again as many such stories do, with a boy and a girl and the promise of love?

In actuality the promise was little more than an arranged marriage that would surely go loveless but was otherwise necessary for the goodwill of the bordering city of Luray.

The royal family of Luray had two children: the crown prince, Jasper, and the princess, Jade. In his infancy the crown prince of Luray was promised to the yet-to-be-born First Daughter of Mystic Falls. It was also in his infancy that Jasper succumbed to a ghastly fever. The king and queen of Luray waited until their living daughter, Jade, now crown princess, lived two years to promise her too to the First Daughter.

Luray and Mystic Falls would have their union after all.

Mystic Falls would aid Luray in rebuilding and the young heir apparents would one day rule both territories under the flag of Mystic Falls.

Yet there was one small problem.

In their youth, Hope, First Daughter of Mystic Falls, could not stand the crown princess of Luray. Not one bit. Jade wasn’t too sweet on her either, history will tell you. Hope was cautious and withdrawn and Jade independent and earnest. Where Hope was brittle Jade was compassionate, what Hope lashed out at Jade preferred to analyze. Hope was cold as the worst winter’s ice and Jade was scorching and determined as a dry summer prairie fire. Hope could not control Jade, so Hope did not want her. In the First Daughter’s eyes the crown princess was weak. 

But it was not weakness Jade was beholden to — no, that was secrecy. Her father called it selective silence, a Luray sentiment held in high esteem among the royal family. Privacy was a right in their land while in Mystic Falls under King Alaric I it was a privilege. At the time it may have been the greatest difference between the lands. It was also, at the time, the shield keeping the royals of Mystic Falls from learning of Jade’s true origin.

You see, Jade was not, in fact, the daughter of both the king and queen of Luray. While the king indeed fathered the girl, her mother was a palace hand who tended horses in the stables and cooked in the kitchens. She was called Opal and she was the gentlest maiden the king of Luray had ever known. Which is all you must know for now, and which is what the royal family of Mystic Falls would not learn until many years after Jade’s marriage to the First Daughter.

As the term ‘First Daughter’ implies a second, and perhaps a third, it is high time you learn.

You know of Hope.

Elizabeth came next, kicking and screaming, and would never once lose the spirit she was born with.

Last came Josette, the quiet one, who did not cry until her fifth day alive, and who would one day lose her composure for all the kingdom to see.

Hope was fifteen when she wed the crown princess of Luray, and it was not a happy marriage. Her father, King Alaric, insisted heavily on the union, and the royal family of Luray was more than happy to tether their nobility to the likes of a Saltzman. In the first year of their marriage Luray saw tremendous repairs on their side of the border, the Old Border. Bridges were mended, dams reinforced, and Alaric built from scratch a new strip of (what at the time was called) the King’s Wall to keep Luray shielded in the north.

Though she was older than the First Daughter by little more than two years, Jade and Hope’s juxtaposition was painfully jarring.

While Jade lived at the palace in the capital city of Mystic Falls she was apt to spend her time with the horses and the king’s men-at-arms rather than with her wife. Her interests centered around metalsmithing and wildlife, Hope’s around hierarchy and ceremony. Hope wanted Jade to act the part of princess and learn the customs of royal Mystic Falls, waltzes and all, and Jade wanted to learn the ins and outs of the armory and the knights’ training regimen.

Princesses did not fight, Hope insisted, not in Mystic Falls. Battles, in her eyes, were to be fought by peasants and those in debt to the Crown; Jade saw knighthood as a great honor.

While Hope hosted balls and banquets and received visiting nobility with false pleasantries, Jade traded festivities for liquor and laughs with stable hands and gardeners who behaved infinitely more genuine than she’d ever seen Hope act.

They were largely unhappy until Jade grew close with the Second Daughter of Mystic Falls.

Lizzie was alive where Hope lacked passion, and she cared not for the Crown that her eldest sister put on a pedestal out of reach. Lizzie was happy to introduce Jade to her favorite knights, to her close friend the butcher, and to teach her the lay of the tunnels that sprawled beneath the palace grounds. With Lizzie there was joy unhindered by marital obligations. They shared many an interest, and quickly became confidants. 

It drove Hope mad. Jade was still her wife, after all.

And then, a few short years later, the rebels pounced.

Made up of men scorned by Hope and Alaric — many of whom lost brothers and sons and land to old war at the behest of the Crown and received nothing for the sacrifice — they attacked from the forest in the east and called themselves the Originals.

Forbidden to fight, Jade and Lizzie stole aside and together they crept from the palace to watch the battle from safety on the sidelines.

They did not like what they saw simply because neither princess nor Second Daughter were permitted to participate.

That was, of course, until they decided to participate anyway. They tied kerchiefs over their faces, leaving open only their eyes, borrowed battered swords from the training grounds, and took to the fields. Jade took four lives on that battlefield, and Lizzie seven.

In three hours it was over.

Lizzie and Jade returned to the palace to find Hope missing, presumed captured and killed by rebels, Alaric in hysterics, and the staff walking on eggshells. They snuck after Alaric as he sprinted, flailing like a madman, out into the stables to fetch his steed and give chase. Hope was, after all, his pride and joy, his favorite daughter, and to lose her to the likes of woodland heathens would be a grave embarrassment. Moments later a stray rebel snuck into the stables behind Alaric.

There was shouting, and then there was talking in hushed and harsh tones, and finally blows of fisticuffs sounded out. Lizzie sent Jade for guards and ran to her father’s aid.

It was presumed no one but the Second Daughter left the stables alive that day. Alaric was killed with his own sword and the rebel was dealt with, at Lizzie’s hand, with the very same sword.

Lizzie’s was the only account of the incident, and no one thought to disbelieve her, though she may have scrapped a detail or two.

Like was there truly just  _ one _ rebel in the stables that day? And if so, and if Lizzie had truly bested him with the weapon that killed her father, then where was Alaric’s blade?

The sword, called the Ascendant, was not to be seen again. 


	2. i.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet the royals, officially.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, mostly unedited.  
> enjoy.

**_NINE-ISH YEARS LATER._ **

“We are not going to  _ war _ ,” hissed Josie Saltzman, Third Daughter of the great kingdom of Mystic Falls, her harsh and hushed tone rendered unnecessary by the nearby hoots and hollers of the queen’s men-at-arms as wine and mead were gulped and guzzled as only great men could gulp and guzzle.

Josie knew full well how Lizzie longed to be seated among the men instead of between her younger sister and the First Officer of the Crown. But this was a most formal affair, and all formalities must be taken. A neighboring lord and lady had come to visit and appearances must be kept up if a profitable trade deal was to be solidified.

The queen snatched a length of roasted squash from Josie’s plate and sank her teeth in, paying the warm oil oozing from the corners of her mouth no mind.

Josie began again: “Lizzie—”

“Nobody said anything about  _ going _ to war,” said Lizzie through a mouthful, washed down by a swig of cider. “I said I  _ miss _ war. Huge difference.”

What she meant was:  _ I loathe being trapped in this palace. I despise waking up each morning to the same ceiling and the same walls and the same staff who do the same mundane chores day after day.  _ Palace life was stuffy and stagnant and Lizzie was suffocating, that’s what she meant. It was not a new sentiment.

Mystic Falls had not seen war for five years, and what they saw then was enough to snag Lizzie with a jagged hook and reel her in fast. Wartime was brutal and beautiful and the queen fell in love on the battlefield;  _ with _ the battlefield.

The First Officer of the Crown, a man known to be stoic and silent until otherwise necessary, inserted himself then.

“No one should miss war,” said the First Officer. “Too many men die. Fathers, husbands. Sons. You shouldn’t miss war.”

Lizzie looked at him, in all his glory, with his long black hair pulled back by a leather band and his large dark eyes. He was not a man known to smile often. Instead she flashed one of her own, toothy and smug, with the added challenge of a raised brow.

“Your Grace,” amended the First Officer.

“Attaboy.”

There was rarely a point in arguing with Lizzie. She was stubborn as a mule and ludicrous as a winged pig. One needed a lifetime of knowledge of Lizzie, which very few had, if they were to truly understand the Queen of Mystic Falls. On occasion Josie caught herself wishing she lacked such knowledge, for it would be ever easier to accept a declaration of longing for war if she did not know exactly what it meant.

To Josie it meant Lizzie was growing sick and tired of ruling a kingdom from the confines of the palace, of the capital city, the boundaries of which Josie had not left in years. It meant Lizzie would rather be out risking her life for land that no one wanted for any good reason than be safe at home with her sister. The worst part, the part that bit hardest into Josie’s vulnerable skin, was that she could not blame her sister for any of it. Not the boredom, not the yearning, not even the impatience with life in peacetime, for Lizzie Saltzman was born for many things, you should know, but she was first and foremost born to run. To take to the plains, brandishing her shortsword, wind whipping through her golden hair, cavalry charging alongside her, mouth agape with the call of the royal battle cry.

Wars could be waged and won at supper tables over roast and fine enough wine, Josie knew, but not a thing compared to battle in her sister’s eyes.

“You’re both being foolish,” said Josie aloud without thinking. After a moment she decided she was right. “Don’t encourage her, Kaleb. She’ll argue your every point, you know that. I’ll hear nothing more of war from either of you.” She went to wipe the grease from her sister’s face with a dinner cloth and was met with grumbled protest that she paid no mind.

The rest of the banquet went off without a hitch.

Lizzie spoke no more of war, but spoke only to the visiting lord and lady. Appearances, you understand.

Calm quiet was expected of Kaleb Hawkins, First Officer of the Crown, but fitful silence was largely out of character for Josie. Luckily only the queen seemed to notice, but said nothing.

The palace slept soundly that night.

Until it didn’t.

…

A fourteen hour shift on the perimeter barrier was preferable to what Kaleb was about to do. Many of his men would choose slaying a dragon, should they exist, over this. Kaleb himself wondered briefly if he wouldn’t rather join an excavation team in the flats than complete this mission.

Alas, there was business to be handled. Justice to be handed down.

And so the queen must be awoken before the sun had risen. A questionable feat.

“I don’t know who you think you are,” mumbled Lizzie from beneath her velvet quilt, “but this is treason. I’ll have your head come sunrise.”

“Your Grace,” began Kaleb. “Hear first my reasons, and judge me second.”

The moment of silence that followed lasted longer than Kaleb was prepared to wait for an answer, but given the time, and given what he knew of his queen, and the stunted movements of a slowly waking body beneath velvet linens, he was resigned to wait. He counted sixty seconds in his head, then one-hundred-and-twenty, and though a patient man he was there was nothing to stop his foot from tapping restlessly against the stone floor.

“You’re still here?” asked Lizzie, defeat beginning to creep into her tone. “I’ll have your feet, too, if you don’t cut that shit out.”

“Your Grace,” said Kaleb again. “If I may—”

“You may not.”

Kaleb bit his tongue.

Progress was slower than a cattle plow nearing the end of its pull, but it was progress nonetheless. No matter how frustrating. But Lizzie was gradually sitting up, taking care to stretch each of her limbs until something popped and from her mouth came a satisfied little grunt, and doing her best to wake neither of the dozing bodies she shared a bed with.

If Kaleb Hawkins was not the man he was, a wildly stoic and professional man when in uniform, he would tell the queen outright how he missed the days of their youth when Lizzie was little more than a rambunctious adolescent with a title she was happy to shirk and he was but an officer’s son with a heart for adventure and too much time on his hands. Long gone were the days of riding side-by-side to Roanoke for festivals and tournaments with no guard in tow; no longer did they drink among commoners in crumbling pubs, or fish with the fishermen in the North River and feast — just them two — over a stone field stove on the riverbank.

Now she was his queen and he her officer, and those days were so long gone Kaleb was unsure he correctly remembered what it was to be a child with a best friend.

Instead he forced his tongue to articulate the formal speech his father taught him long ago when  _ he _ was the First Officer of Alaric Saltzman’s Crown.

“With all due respect, highness, Mystic Falls needs you at your best right now.” And  _ I need you to listen _ .

“This is still treason,” she decided, yawning loudly. But urgency must have read easily on Kaleb’s face, for Lizzie slid out of bed and made for the wardrobe without another word.

It was, of course, nowhere near treason, just impressively inconvenient, for the banquet had ended four short hours ago and after such a night of feasting and drinking she had expected to sleep until midday.

“If I may,” said Kaleb again, and this time Lizzie did not deny him. “We may have an  _ actual _ case of treason on our hands.”

Suddenly, as if he’d spoken magic words, Lizzie was wide awake with new light in her eyes. She looked quizzically at Kaleb as she pulled a gray wool cloak from the wardrobe and covered herself. Without the fantastical colors of formal palace attire she looked so much more like the unburdened girl Kaleb grew up with. The Crown, he thought, was not only heavy on his old friend’s head. He could see its weight on her heart, and he saw it begin to lift at mention of treason. It was, after all, one of her favorite words.

Treason, for Lizzie, was at least exciting. Certainly more so than any banquet, no matter the profits of deals signed over dinner.

“Tell me, then,” said the queen. “What’s happening?”

“There’s been an attempt on your life, Your Grace.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come yell at me on twitter @jackassdotjpg if u want i guess


	3. ii.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> (Most of) the royals discuss the situation. We meet the assassin and her jailer. Events of nine years ago come rushing back to the queen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sort of sparsely edited. lil bit of a longer chapter, this one. enjoy!!

“Don’t you think I’d _know_ if there’d been an attempt on my life?” asked the queen from her throne. Lizzie was slouched in her seat, wrapped in a cloak of wool, barefoot, with a leg thrown over an arm of the throne.

The sun had yet to rise, still, but her Round Table had risen to assemble.

Before her stood Kaleb and his right-hand military tactician, Second Officer of the Crown, a man with a single name: Jed. Beside them shivered Rafael Waithe, the queen’s First Gentleman, still in his nightclothes and with no cover for warmth. To Lizzie’s left — seated in a noticeably smaller throne than her own — was her wife, the king by title, who, as acting Lord Chancellor of Mystic Falls, had final say in judicial rulings and could be vetoed only by Lizzie herself.

Jed stepped forward and showed Lizzie the scrap of yellow fabric in his hand. It looked to be torn from a tabard or a flag, one could not be sure, but Lizzie would recognize the seal it carried anywhere: the beaked and winged silhouette of a phoenix stitched in black.

The family crest of the Young Lords Clarke and Kirby.

“My men on shift apprehended an assassin just inside the town wall, Your Grace,” said Jed, offering Lizzie the scrap in an outstretched hand. “He was wearing this crest.”

Lizzie took the piece and grazed her thumb over the embroidered bird, rubbed the coarse yellow canvas between her fingers. “...they would have sent someone in silks,” she muttered to herself, turning the scrap over in her hand.

“What’s that, sweets?” asked Jade from her throne where she lounged with a wineskin cradled to her chest as if it were an infant. The loose waves of her hair cast shadows over her eyes, but Lizzie caught her lips twitching with worry.

“If they had official business they’d have sent a courier in silks,” said Lizzie.

“Or feline furs,” said Rafael.

It was an old custom still widely respected in these parts. When sending a messenger to a nearby household the quality of your messenger’s dress should reflect the importance and honor of your message. A canvas tabard cut from old flour sacks or wrapping cloth was an insult at best. At worst?

“Precisely,” said Kaleb. “Add the fact that the assassin was carrying a portrait of you, Your Grace, and we have a credible threat.” He pulled a scroll from his belt and handed it to Lizzie.

A poor man’s rendition of the portrait painted for Lizzie’s seventeenth birthday, shortly before her coronation, stared back at her: a shot from the chest up, done in black and gray, fashioned much like a common thief’s wanted poster. At the time still a new ruler, a girl with little to no formal responsibility, her features were softer and her smug smile less hardened than the one that frequented her face nowadays. The Lizzie in the portrait was gentler than any Lizzie Mystic Falls had seen in years.

There was, too, the small matter of the thick black Xs over the portrait’s eyes.

The mark of execution.

“I’m _freezing_ ,” grumbled Rafael. “If we have this assassin locked safely in the cells is there any reason at all for us to be awake at this hour?”

Kaleb opened his mouth to justify the time but was quickly cut off.

“Come on, dummy,” said Lizzie, drawing open her cloak. “I got room. _And_ ” — she narrowed her eyes at Kaleb — “I’m beginning to wonder the very same thing. I was promised treason.”

Jade shook her head. She might have chuckled, might have not, but was surely grinning. The wineskin passed from her own hand to Rafael’s as the First Gentleman crossed the stone floor to tuck in under Lizzie’s cloak.

“Is it still treason,” began Rafael, pulling Lizzie onto his lap, “if Lord Clarke and his idiot brother don’t consider their city a territory of the Crown?”

“Yes,” said Kaleb.

“It is,” said Jed.

“He’s your idiot brother, too,” mumbled Jade. “Degenerate nobles. Bunch of criminals.”

“ _You_ were a criminal once,” said Rafael.

“Sure as shit I was,” said Jade. “Least I was a good one.”

“Still a criminal,” said Rafael.

“And yet here I am,” said Jade. “A full-fledged king.”

Lizzie grinned.

“Highnesses,” said Jed, cutting off the tangent with impatience thick in his tone. “Whether or not the Young Lords believe they’re a part of Mystic Falls, their land lies within kingdom boundaries on all official records.”

Kaleb nodded. One could not bend borders by wishing them away. “Ergo, treason.”

“Great,” said Lizzie. “Can I take my man and woman back to my quarters now?”

Rhetorical, of course, because the queen answered to no one. Perhaps not even God. She patted Rafael on the cheek and they rose to their feet one after the other, Jade following suit. By all accounts this could be dealt with come daylight, if this interruption of a sound sleep did not keep them drowsing until dusk.

And then the First Officer addressed the queen by name: “Lizzie,” said Kaleb, his voice clipped and a bit too sharp. This was not his place, and yet — “This is personal. The assassin claims to possess the sword that killed your father.”

Lizzie stopped in her tracks.

Jade grunted in disbelief.

Even Rafael looked surprised, his ambivalence to late night wake-up calls momentarily forgotten.

“He has the Ascendant?” Lizzie sounded defiant and disbelieving just then, like a child after supper demanding a second portion of pudding after thrice being told no.

“Unconfirmed, Your Grace,” said Kaleb. “But we have strong reason to believe he speaks the truth.”

“First light,” decided Lizzie. “Wake me then. I’d like to meet this assassin.”

…

Come first light the Round Table rose again to reconvene in the throne room at the queen’s request. The royals, dressed leisurely and inconsistent with one another, shared a yawn as the First and Second officers stood at attention in the lightweight armor of the palace guard.

A spread of freshly baked bread, still warm from the oven, meats and cheeses, and blackened vegetables sat on a small banquet table before the thrones (and the high-backed leather seat pulled beside them for the queen’s First Gentleman). Warm mugs of cider went all around.

Lizzie had not managed to return to sleep after being woken in the night; if it weren’t for the news of her father’s weapon she may have managed. Nine years, it had been, since she last laid eyes on the Ascendant. Nine years since the First War of the Originals, since she darted into the stables after her father and was the only one known to emerge alive. Nine years was a fine chunk of time for a woman to spend wondering what had become of the sword most famous for leading her ancestor, William Forbes, to victory against the outlaws.

A family heirloom, by all standards, the Ascendant should not have fallen out of Saltzman hands, though Lizzie was one of only two who knew precisely why it had. It was for that same reason that she would call for the very brutal and very public execution of this assassin, whoever it may be. She had a rather good idea who, however.

“I believe it’s time we proceed,” said Kaleb. “The palace will wake soon, and to err on the side of caution is to keep unwanted ears from listening at the door.”

Lizzie looked at him over the rim of her mug, unimpressed with his polite warning. “You can say Josie, I won’t have your head for it.”

“Your Grace,” acknowledged Kaleb with a simple nod. He would not speak ill of the princess, no matter the queen’s dismissal.

There were both emotional and political reasons Lizzie used to justify keeping her sister at arm’s length in matters of noble squabbles and safety of the realm.

Josie, for one thing, believed in placid diplomacy and the power of peaceful debate. There were very few issues, in her mind, that could not be solved over tea and without need for savagery. She was naive in that respect, Lizzie believed, as many young people were, to hold faith in discussion over aggression. Reality was quite the opposite, as any great ruler of the time will tell you; reality was that there were very few issues that _could_ be solved without violence, though it was not impossible, but to give that sliver of hope to the princess would be to never hear the end of it when violence _was_ necessary.

There were also the matters of cruelty and weakness. Lizzie knew a true ruler would at one time or another risk showing the latter if they did not resort to the former, and weakness could not be afforded in such a day and age, so a harsh hand was often an adequate fix. This greatly disappointed Josie, of course, but room could not be left for the greater good of Mystic Falls to risk losing its footing.

And then there were the blatant anti-war ideologies. Josie believed in pacifism unless completely necessary for defense, a sentiment that would surely see her dead or worse should she venture too far from the capital city alone, for no one at all was sure of the princess’s capability to self-defend.

Waging war was necessary, on occasion, and Lizzie was a mighty fine fighter, no matter the opponent.

Emotionally, the queen could be manipulated by very few people. Three people exactly, in fact, two of whom were already present and shared many of her own beliefs, which left only Josie to sit Round Tables out. 

In their youth the Daughters of Mystic Falls made up two distinct alliances.

Hope and Lizzie, the cunning and the reckless, whose shared fantasies of grand battles and the grander victory banquets that followed meshed well and meshed often in a house of royalty. When they played as children it was often as damsel and white knight, Hope in velvets and Lizzie brandishing a wooden sword.

Lizzie and Josie, the reckless and the benevolent, who spent rare nights in the north tower under a blanket of stars while Josie detailed the constellations and Lizzie whittled little wooden animals for the younger twin to paint. Josie turned Lizzie soft even then, shedding light on the gentleness of her heart and teaching her what it was to live with patience and love.

Lastly, between Hope and Josie, there existed a one-sided rivalry that the Third Daughter could not comprehend. Hope, believing as First Daughter she was entitled to all she pleased, took every opportunity to monopolize Lizzie’s time and leave Josie on her lonesome. Wanting only to see her sisters happy, Josie took what little time with Lizzie she was allowed and learned to steer clear of Hope once she understood her attempts to please her eldest sister were for naught. What she could not understand was what she had done to foster such hostility.

If Hope’s disappearance and presumed death nine years earlier brought any grace to the royal house it was the space left for Lizzie and Josie to grow close as Josie had always wished. It was this bond that sprouted Josie’s ability to wiggle into Lizzie’s emotional brain and sway things her way. Used mostly for extra helpings at supper when they were still young, or her pick of the walking paths when they strolled the gardens, it was nonetheless still a useful tool. 

Perhaps it worked as well as it did because, with Hope gone, Lizzie realized just how little time she was spending with her twin, or because in the years since they had grown to understand one another on such a cellular level that she could not fathom a time without that bond. Whichever way — if Josie wanted Lizzie in her corner on many matters, she had to do little more than pout and bat her eyes and say please.

So, as you see, it was wisest for Lizzie to leave her twin out of certain things.

“Fetch me my crown,” said Lizzie, “and then bring me the assassin.”

The queen had two crowns, identical in all but color and marks of wear and tear. Each was fashioned from a single block of white gold and bore eight pyramidal spikes, elongated vertically, around a simple band, with the largest spike meant to be centered on the forehead.

The Saltzman crown was un-jeweled, un-gilded, and polished daily to maintain its simple silver elegance.

The second crown, commissioned by Lizzie shortly before her first siege as queen, was made from the Saltzman crown’s mold but dipped and baked in black enamel to resemble the dark, reflective sheen of the Saltzman family stone (and if it were not wildly impractical she would have demanded a crown of solid obsidian itself). This crown, locked in a padded box and kept in Lizzie’s quarters, was to be handled only by the queen herself. This she called the War Crown.

Jed brought Lizzie the Saltzman crown, the ceremonial black velvet cloak of the sovereign, and the mantle of golden Canadian sable fur that went with it. Decidedly less burdened by formality than Kaleb, Jed held few qualms about insisting the queen, at the very least, dressed the part.

“My respect is yours, Your Grace,” said Jed, “but I won’t have you play judge and juror in the same clothing you wear to drink with our men in the barracks.”

Jade snorted. “Careful now, Officer,” she said. “Keep being mean to her like that and she’ll fall in love with you next.” She rose to her feet and made hands for the royal garments. There was no ceremony to draping the queen in fine fabrics and sealing it with precious metal, but Jade made her own; she’d long ago begun to favor dressing Lizzie for public reception as an expression of her affection, be it for assassin or court.

The cloak fit perfectly around Lizzie’s slim shoulders, its brass clasp resting heavily on her sternum. The mantle went over it, fastened with a leather strap and buckle, and the plush golden fur tickled her chin. The Saltzman crown made her head feel heavy and in turn made her movements slow and deliberate, and with the weight of the crown her childish, tipsy grin faded into a grim scowl.

“Would you look at that,” said Jade, drawing her fingers through Lizzie’s hair until it hung over her ears. “At last — a queen.”

“Pipe down, bloodhound,” said Lizzie, but smiled.

“ _All_ of you,” said Kaleb, “please.”

…

The dungeon was cold, as well as damp and deafeningly silent, and one could not escape the smell of wet dog and human blood. The stone walls were wet and heavy with the stench.

Another smell lingered, one you would not know if you hadn’t known it already. You’d think it charcoal, or settled ash, or another something mundane. Something dreadfully boring. But there was only one fire pit in the dungeon and it was nowhere near the assassin’s cell. Nor was it in use.

The assassin was used to the odor of livestock and blood, but that of burnt human flesh was not something she cared to become comfortable with.

Penelope Park could not move without pulling at the wound on her leg. The _brand_ on her thigh. It was trying so desperately to heal, but without proper cleaning and dressing it was left a mess of crusted blood and dead flesh. It would not even heal to a fine mark — no, it would look juvenile and crude when it finally healed. Which, she supposed, could have been worse.

For the brand was the Queen’s Mark, a small letter e enclosed in a large Q, and wearing that neat on her skin would not be much better than a mass of thick, bubbled, messy scar tissue.

No matter what she did or how she moved, some part of the wound stretched and tore back open, leaving her with an accumulation of screaming skin and blood that oozed steadily enough to remain wet. It hadn’t bled at first, not when she’d been given the mark, but it didn’t take long for the skin around the edges to harden and crack and split open to spill scarlet.

If only she hadn’t opened her mouth.

Well, no, that wasn’t quite right. If she hadn’t spoken of the Ascendant they would have killed her hours ago. Instead, because the words slipped out in a fit of desperation, and because Penelope was not trained in the etiquette of captivity, they attempted to torture it out of her. Guards beat her until her face bled, until her vision blurred, until she could no longer stand. It may have worked if she were someone else, but Penelope was seasoned, long used to senseless beatings, and would not confess to just anyone. She was quite sure they were going to kill her as it was, so best to have some fun with the queen’s guards if it was the last fun she would live to have.

It was the older guard, the one the others called Captain, who had come with the branding iron.

“You are so hungry for power,” Penelope had said the first time they met, low and gravelly.

“Is that so?” 

“You’ll torture anyone who has the misfortune of finding themselves in your way.”

“It’s within my legal right,” the captain told her.

“Yet you answer to a woman fifteen years your junior. A woman who spends her days drinking —”

“Careful now.”

“— and her nights _whoring_ with the boys who dare to call themselves knights.”

The captain clicked her tongue and, “See, now you’ve insulted not only myself but Her Royal Highness _and_ the men who fight for this land. You’ll learn from this,” she’d said, flashing a wicked and horrible smile.

All Penelope learned was that stark honesty, in Mystic Falls, was rewarded with physical harm. And now she wore the queen’s brand, and would until she died. She wished for the courage to scrape out the mark with her fingernails, scratch it into an indiscernible gash while the wound was still open. But even the thought of such pain as that made her ears ring.

At least they hadn’t stripped her and lashed her back raw. At least they still believed her to be a man, at least she had that, for as a woman she would have their pity, and that was somehow worse.

When the captain came to fetch her from the cell she brought the tattered frock they apprehended her in. Her cheeks were streaked with blood, dust, and grime, and her hair was so thick with dirt it looked blacker than it had ever been. The captain, a hard looking woman with dark hair and even darker eyes, flashed a humorless smile as she threw the coat at Penelope’s feet and snapped her fingers. Two guards came to flank her in the doorway. Penelope thought they looked smug, satisfied with the pleasure of seeing her at her worst. Happy to be the ones to put her there.

Fingers stiff with the overnight cold, aching even with the simple strain of pulling on the coat, Penelope forced her muscles to cooperate. She did not have much choice, not with the guards and their captain sneering at her like she was a maggot in the dirt. When the captain ordered her to make haste she had half a mind to tell the cruel woman what exactly she thought of her demands.

 _If you’d met me in my prime_ , Penelope thought, _you’d have thought twice, thrice, and then some about giving me orders like that_.

Penelope was not born with terror to give, but she’d taught herself to wield it. Even before her parents left her to the wolves she’d perfected the art, but it was not of much use when she was injured and dehydrated and her heart was pleading with her to find some way out of this.

 _I’d have killed you_ , she thought.

The frock covered the tear in her trousers and the coarse wool was unkind against the Queen’s Mark. Penelope forced herself to her feet and yelped as her muscles strained and protested. This amused the guards and dug at Penelope’s pride; she had not stood since they marked her. Never once did she imagine longing for her cot of hay in the Kirby stables, but there she was, about ready to give an arm and a leg for a soft bed on which to lay her head where — at _least_ — she knew what horrors awaited her upon waking.

Mystic Falls was a lawless land, so far as she was concerned, ruled by a brash young woman too immature to truly understand what it meant to be queen.

Penelope would know.

The collective ego of the guards only made it that much more evident.

And there were still the events of the First War.

Penelope saw enough back then.

…

Ever since the mention of the Ascendant early that morning Lizzie had a dreadful suspicion who exactly her guards planned to drag before her. She thought of the First War and drank to calm her prickling nerves. If her suspicion was to be confirmed she wished they’d hurry with it, at the very least.

It did not take long.

Captain Seylah Chelon of the palace guard and one of her men dragged the assassin in by the elbows.

Lizzie bristled.

Dirty shoulder-length hair clouded an even dirtier face and a stunted gait betrayed the captain’s torture, but the queen knew precisely who she was looking at. She knew it unwise, too, to care about the brand, knew not to allow recognition into her eyes, and lastly knew for certain that execution was imperative.

Kaleb had called the assassin _he_. She was not about to correct him.

The offender was short and thin with the unnaturally tight skin of one who lacked the luxury of regular meals, Lizzie could tell, even beneath the coat. She’d looked healthier nine years ago.

“Your Grace,” began Kaleb, anxious to hurry along the proceedings should the princess wake and become wise. “He won’t give us a name, or much of anything for that matter, but may I present the assassin for your judgement.”

If she didn’t know any better, if she wasn’t familiar with the blank, hardened face staring back at her, Lizzie could understand mistaking her for a man. Her officers were concerned with the attempt on her life, and the assassin was small and skinny and shrouded in layers, and if only the offense instead of the offense _and_ the offender was truly considered it was a simple enough mistake to make, she supposed.

“Ad mortem,” said the queen at the very same moment the First Gentleman blurted out “ _He?_ ”

Rafael leapt from his seat before Lizzie could protest. A sigh and a grit of her teeth was all she could manage, and a weary look shared with Jade. The assassin, with some difficulty, straightened her back to stand tall as the First Gentleman approached.

“If you’re a man,” said Rafael, eyes narrowing, “I was born yesterday.”

“Excuse me?” said Kaleb.

“Oh, hell,” said Jade.

Jed pinched the bridge of his nose and said nothing. 

Seylah and her guard snickered.

“You’ve been torturing a _lady_ ,” said Rafael, scowling at Seylah. “We all know dungeon hospitality amounts to about _shit_.”

Affording kinder treatment to female prisoners was an outdated custom, surely, but widely practiced. Especially in the territories that once belonged to Rafael and his brother. You could not argue against it in the place without Rafael making his favor known.

Lizzie was less apt to care about such trivialities.

“I don’t care about that,” said the assassin as if she were right there in the queen’s mind, drawing all eyes. She lifted her chin and tried to shake the hair out of her face with little success. “I wish to speak with the queen.”

“Why don’t we get you a bath first?” said Rafael, not unkindly, but there was that pity. 

“No. I wish to speak to —”

“So _speak_ ,” Lizzie cut in, finally, waving an impatient hand.

The assassin shook her head, said, “Alone.”

A moment of silence fell. No one expected the queen to comply. Scornful laughter, or impatient disdain, or any of the other vast variations of annoyance Lizzie was known for, that’s what they expected.

It was meeting the assassin’s eyes and finding no fear, no regret, and certainly no apology that made up Lizzie’s mind. She knew which cards were left to play, and only one was in her favor. 

So, “Clear the room,” said Lizzie.

Protest erupted at once. Only Jade was silent, until she wasn’t.

“You heard the lady,” she barked. The room fell silent. “Everyone out.”

“That’s not the wisest —”

“She said _out_ , Kaleb.”

And out they went, quite sourly, leaving their beloved queen to face off with the grim assassin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spare comments? complaints? can be found on twitter @jackassdotjpg


	4. iii.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> History revisited, a secret revealed, and a peek into the woods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kapow. i am very tired but i edited this a lil bit. enjoy.

“You remember me,” said the assassin. “I see it in your eyes.”

“I’ll give you that,” said Lizzie, shrugging. “You’ve looked better.”

A wry smile graced the face the queen looked upon, she was surprised to see, but it looked at home on its gaunt bearer.

Nine years was a fine amount of time to forget a face. Under the circumstances Lizzie expected nothing less than to take her memory of this one into the ground with her.

“You can thank the Young Lords for that much.”

“You work for them?”

“No.”

“You wore their crest,” said Lizzie, fishing the scrap of fabric from a pocket. “And you rode in to kill me, did you not?”

“I did.”

“But you don’t work for them?”

“Correct.”

Lizzie sighed. “Then help me understand, if only for my own benefit.” Her plan to march the assassin to the gallows herself was still ripe at the forefront of her mind, still the most logical course of action, but speaking to this woman alone was perhaps a mistake.

“I wish to speak of your father’s sword,” said the assassin, “not the status of my employment.”

The air changed. Thickened. As many drinks as Lizzie put down at breakfast seemed suddenly too many; her head spun. Two equal parts of her heart, one hardened by the crown and the other supple with what little youth she had left, squared off within her chest. Either she wanted to put the matter of the Ascendant to bed once and for all, or she wanted to unearth the sins she’d committed with the sword herself. She could not want both, nor could she _have_ both, unless she was prepared to offer the warm vein in her throat to the swift blade of justice.

Above most things, Elizabeth of Mystic Falls did not want to die. People were counting on her — Josie, Jade, Rafael, Kaleb, Jed, the _kingdom_ — to lead them. She could not do that from a grave. The hardened heart would win out, she knew.

“Speak.”

“Do you remember what you said to me that day, nine years ago?”

Lizzie nodded tersely. She remembered few things as vividly.

“You were standing over the dead rebel,” the assassin went on, “looking at that sword like it had a mind of its own.”

_It does_ , she thought.

“You were scared.”

“I was _not_.”

“Perhaps not,” said the assassin. “But you thrust the Ascendant to my chest and said, ‘ _Run. Far, and bury this._ ’ Do you remember?”

“Not easy to forget,” offered Lizzie. “I’m quite sure I told you, too, that I never wanted to see your face again. If I remember correctly.”

“Yes,” said the assassin. “About that.”

Lizzie waited.

What the Ascendant could do no longer mattered, in the grand scheme of things, because its whereabouts would die with the woman in tattered dress before the queen, and no more would it be spoken of until the last Saltzman fell. And when that happened it hardly mattered at all what a seer could see in the stretch of its blade.

The assassin cleared her throat.

“Your name first,” decided Lizzie. “If I am to kill you I should, at the very least, know what to mark your grave.”

“Penelope.”

“Proceed.”

“If I may,” she went on, daring a step closer to the throne, “and I mean no harm by these words, but your blood still breathes.”

“You’re going to have to be less cryptic than that.”

Penelope lifted her chin, locked on to Lizzie’s weary eyes, and said: “The First Daughter lives.”

...

Two years and seventeen days.

That’s how long it took Hope Saltzman to become accustomed to life in the woods.

Another hundred to not actively despise it. 

Another year to know it better than she’d ever known palace life.

In the woods you must remain vigilant, aware, eyes peeled at all times for danger from all sides including above, ever ready for an ambush no matter the time or place. In the palace you could be docile, you were sheltered, and separated from danger by stone walls ten feet thick. And Hope was royalty there. Complacent, she knew.

But — hell, she was royalty in the trees, too. With a crown of thorns and a cloak of crudely stitched hides. With a throne of twisted roots and a people whose custom it was to pledge their loyalty by blood and who had spilled red for Hope without her ever having to ask.

Now, anything she did ask of them would be honored without hesitation.

At present, however, she was unsure if she wanted to ask anything of them at all. She knew what she wanted — her kingdom back under a single flag, peace, the stray strands of her family woven back into thread — but had as yet concocted no single plan of execution within reason.

To lay siege to the kingdom of Mystic Falls was unwise, surely, no matter which way she looked at it. There were people there she cared for still. And she had but a thousand men against their thirty. A battle lost before the battlefield was ever reached, that would be. And Hope was not that reckless, not when she knew now why Alaric kept the truth from her for so many years.

She did not want his crown — Lizzie’s now, she supposed, and that made her smug — or the wealth he left behind. Not even the palace was appealing as it once was.

“...my darling niece appears to be stuck in that stubborn head of hers.”

Saccharine, saucy, steady as a bowman in the dead of night, that voice was. And enough to pull Hope back down to earth.

“Rebekah.”

“You’re thinking too hard.”

“Queens are allowed their inner turmoil,” said a man not far behind.

Marcel, always in tow.

“It isn’t turmoil,” said Hope, giving the man a shove. “More like indecision.”

“So talk,” said Rebekah. “Figure it out aloud.”

Easier said than done. Words came easy to Rebekah, always on the tip of her tongue, and never seemed to fail her, whereas Hope could open her mouth and have nothing spill out for hours and remain unsurprised.

“I…”

“Go on.”

“My father’s blood still holds the throne of Mystic Falls,” muttered Hope, pulling loose a swatch of bark from the log table they sat around.

Rebekah bristled.

Hardwoods shot up all around, stretching toward the sky, branches reaching for clouds, leaves rustling in the last lick of the day’s wind, and casting shadows about the sprawling camp down low between the trunks. Those with homes nestled up high in the trees tasted dewdrops and new air. All Hope tasted was stagnancy.

Fatherhood was still a touchy subject between Rebekah and Hope, especially in terms of blood.

“Your _father_ ,” said Rebekah, “is dead. Alaric along with him.”

“Right,” said Hope.

As history told her _real_ father was dead months before she was born, a sacrifice of sorts to a god no one bothered to worship any longer. And it was her place he’d taken. His breath stolen so Hope could survive.

“Your _father_ ,” said Rebekah again, harder now, “fell on his sword so that you might stand here today.”

“ _Yes_ ," said Hope, "and I wish I could tell him he shouldn’t have.”

Rebekah softened.

Another touchy subject, that, but they were still blood, and there was still love, and when Hope caught Rebekah’s eye just then she knew her aunt bore her no ill will for the death of Niklaus Mikaelaon so many years before.

“Say that again and I’ll have to smack some sense into you, sweet niece.”

Hope smiled, if halfheartedly. “Saltzman blood still holds the throne of Mystic Falls,” she began again, “and whether I am the —”

“Daughter,” said Rebekah.

“Heir,” said Marcel.

“— _heart_ ,” said Hope. “In the last will of my father he called me his heart. And the Saltzmans know nothing, they remain blind. If they knew I still stood they would crown me once more on sight.”

“And that’s what you want? To be their queen again?”

No.

If it were only so simple as that Hope would not spend precious time stuck between a rock and a hard place. If it were only a matter of wanting to wear the crown again she would have sicced her men on Mystic Falls years ago.

Blood weighed heavy in the kingdom. It’s what made families and painted battlefields. Hope would not deny its importance, but she was raised differently. Her first taste of family was one of honor, born of a handshake between men.

Hope shook her head and debated, if only for a moment, whether it was wise or not to speak the words she intended to. If she was her father’s heart — her _real_ father, not the man who raised her — then she reckoned a mighty slice of her own still lived and breathed in that damned palace.

“I want to see my sisters again,” decided Hope aloud. “My death in their eyes must be rectified.”

Three years and one-hundred-and-seventeen days was all it took for Hope Saltzman to start to fade, but Hope Mikaelson had as of yet not begun to truly prevail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thx for ur time


	5. iv.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The princess unearths a secret, the assassin makes a new acquaintance, and the queen’s wife commits to a secrecy of her own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aha. it’s been a minute. y’all know i rarely ever fuckin edit so that old spiel is gone. enjoy.

Lizzie was in the bath with Jade and a jug of wine when Josie came barging in, red in the face and weighted with disappointment.

“You took a prisoner,” she stated rather than asked. “And you’re going to _execute_ her?”

Jade, suddenly concerned with modesty, sunk low in the tub until the water swallowed her shoulders.

“Yes,” said Lizzie.

“In public,” said Josie. “For people to come and gawk like moths to a flame.”

“That’s one way of putting it,” said Lizzie.

“How could you?”

This was not going to end well.

“It’s nothing I haven’t done before.” Lizzie sighed at the blatant disapproval on Josies’ face. “She tried to kill me.”

In theory, sure; reality was the assassin had not even breached the palace. If what Josie heard was true the guards nabbed her by the town wall, three and a half miles out from the palace. 

Josie scoffed. “Bullshit,” she spit out. “What sort of power trip are you on, Lizzie? You were in _no_ immediate danger.”

A lovely reminder of all the reasons the queen did not include hers sister in such decisions, that was. Until moments like these it saved everyone a bit of grief. Whichever idiot thought it wise to let Josie in on her sister’s plans had something wicked coming.

If Lizzie had her way there would have been no word of the execution until the day of. Would’ve been easier to go through with it had the princess not been afforded time to try and talk the queen out of it.

“I don’t know where you’re getting your information,” said Lizzie, “but I’d be careful if I were you. There are forces at play you’d do best to let alone.”

Josie, bless her heart, had the gall to laugh. “Is that a threat?”

“I’m trying to _protect_ you, Jo.”

“By killing someone and calling the commoners to come and watch.” It was not a question.

Jade, bless _her_ heart, looked as if she’d love nothing more than to get up and bolt. She’d do it, too, if her bahtowel were not laying halfway across the washroom. She knew better than to get in the middle of this one. She’d witnessed many stand-offs like it before, had inserted herself in her fair share, and had grown wise enough to keep her mouth shut lest she welcome an onslaught of grief from her wife.

“Can we talk about this when I’m dressed?”

“Will we actually talk?” Josie crossed her arms, glared. “Or will you avoid me until after you have her head?”

“Don’t give me that.”

“Or what? You’ll have me killed, too?”

“Josie,” sighed Lizzie. “I promise we’ll talk. Just — not now, okay?”

“Fine.”

Josie turned to go.

“Well,” said Jade when she was gone. “She’s not wrong.”

 _Yeah_ , Lizzie thought, _I know._

She was not going to execute the assassin — _Penelope_ , she thought, and wished she’d never asked her name — for treason, or for riding under the Young Lords’ crest. If it were anyone else she would have sired them to the crown and let them serve their sentence in the fields or the cells. Penelope was to be put to death for being in the wrong place at the wrong time, a crime of accident.

“Just because she’s right,” said Jade, reaching for Lizzie’s face, thumbing over her chin, tacking a small smile on her own face, “doesn’t make you wrong.”

At least she could be open with Jade, at least she’d managed all those years ago to tell her through tears of rage and tremors of terror what exactly happened in those stables. At least she was not alone in her burden of knowledge.

But she would not let another soul find out. There was far too much shame buried for that.

Lizzie sipped from their jug of wine and rose slowly from the water. “I need another mind’s eye,” she said, brushing the damp hair back from Jade’s face. “Get me Emma.”

…

There was an hour in the early afternoon, one measly hour, where the palace guard in its entirety took lunch in the courtyard while Kaleb, Jed, and Seylah walked the perimeter and let their men rest.

It was the only period of grace Penelope was allowed.

Three nights had passed since her talk with the queen and nothing had changed. She was still going to be hung, or beheaded, or both, and she hadn’t a clue if anyone could put a stop to it. If someone could, Penelope thought, they wouldn’t, because Mystic Falls loved its queen, and her mission had been to take her from them.

If she still owed debt to the Clarke and Kirby names they might have come for her, sprung her. They valued their slaves enough for that, but she’d taken this mission, succeed or fail, in exchange for her freedom.

Every friend she had was either dead or indebted.

Her parents had not been seen within the kingdom bounds in years.

Nobody was coming to save her. She could not save herself, either, and the sooner she accepted that the sooner death would cease to seem an unfair fate.

Penelope was well and truly alone.

Until she wasn’t.

Soft footsteps echoed in the corridor outside of her cell and her first thought was Seylah, back early to dampen her blessed solitude. They liked to do that, the guards, because there wasn’t much else to do, and Penelope’s pain had become their pleasure.

“Don’t you have somewhere else to be?” Penelope asked from where she lay on her back, leg propped up against her wall to keep her wound away from the dirt.

It was not Seylah’s face that materialized at the door, however, nor was it any of the guards’. She’d never seen this face in person before, but all of the Young Lords’ territory was familiar with her portrait. Penelope did not think the painting did her a lick of justice.

“You shouldn’t be here,” said Penelope, staring, awestruck with beauty and stunned with softness.

“Neither should you,” said the princess.

“At least I have a reason to be.”

It had seemed a good idea at the time, all things considered. The Young Lords needed someone willing to ride, to kill, and finally to run, and no one had stepped forward. No one was reckless — or stupid — enough to take up arms against the crown. Penelope had waited until they were growing desperate, nearly ready to send the Lord Kirby, and then she’d offered herself. On one condition: the debt her parents owed to their name, the debt they had abandoned Penelope in service to, would be wiped clean, whether she returned with Lizzie’s head or not. She reckoned they only agreed because the Lord Kirby was terrified of having to attempt it himself.

So at least she was there, caged up beneath the palace, for a moderately to insanely idiotic reason. What reason did the princess have to be there other than morbid curiosity about the woman who rode in to kill her sister?

Something clattered softly to the floor just inside the door. Penelope looked away, chuckling.

“I don’t want your charity.”

“It’s a leg of lamb, actually,” said the princess. “I thought you might be hungry.”

She was.

But again with the pity. If Penelope respected one thing about the queen it was her indifference. Male or female, a criminal was still a criminal. She’d received no special treatment thus far, for which she was grateful. Kindness would make her feel guilty, and she would do better to avoid such a sentiment.

She’d do best to avoid the princess’s offering, too. No matter how much her mouth watered at the thought of something other than the stale bread and dry strips of venison they kept her alive on.

“ _Better is a dinner of herbs where love is_ ,” began Penelope, sighing lightly, “ _than a stalled ox and hatred therewith_.”

The princess crossed her arms. She was not afraid, Penelope realized. And oh how beautiful she was in her fearlessness. Although there was not much to be afraid of, not any longer, now that Penelope was out of commission and wounded and probably would not hurt a fly if given the chance; she was so tired.

“ _Thou shalt neither vex a stranger, nor oppress him_ ,” said Josie, “ _for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt_.”

Penelope was unsure that applied to someone in her situation, but it warmed her nonetheless. The words were familiar, comforting, like hot cider on a winter’s day.

Scripture was rapidly falling out of the times in the kingdom as more and more noble houses turned to their own personal writings for guidance. Scripture was also the last legacy Penelope had of her parents. Religion ruled them until it did not, until they left family and fate for chance and a life on the run. Her father had left his bible behind, and she’d taught herself to read with it, albeit poorly. Consisted largely of recognizing words when they repeated and sounding out new ones until their meanings disappeared into meaningless sounds, but she’d done it. It made her feel close to her parents, and for whatever reason being close to the people who left her behind so long ago still felt important.

It was nice to hear familiar words, even from a stranger’s mouth. It made her smile, if only a very little bit.

“I don’t know about that,” said Penelope. “I may be a stranger, but I’ve not been put here for nothing.”

“You’ve been put here because the crown is tireless and old. You threatened that.” The princess did not sound upset as she should have.

“Indeed.”

“Were you hired?”

There it was.

“No.”

“But the crest—”

“I’ve already told your sister,” interrupted Penelope. “I did not do this _for_ the Young Lords. I am no longer in debt to them. I did this for myself.”

“Ah,” said the princess, like it was all perfectly fine, like Penelope would not have killed her sister had she not been caught. “I think I understand.”

Penelope sat up. Quickly. She had not meant to admit to her debt. The skin around her brand stretched and stung and Penelope hissed in surprise.

Josie clutched at the door, knuckles white around the bars as she looked in. “Are you hurt?” Her voice was soft, attentive, like she was used to caring for others before she did herself.

 _Yes_ , Penelope thought, _yes_ , she wanted to say. She bit her tongue. She did not think Josie would like to hear about the cruelty her sister’s guards were so comfortable with. No one wanted to hear about how someone they loved was capable of allowing such maltreatment. So, “No,” she said. “Just sore. Sleeping on stone will do that to you.”

“I don’t believe you,” said Josie after a moment of staring, just as Penelope was beginning to burn beneath her gaze. “But I won’t push.”

“How very kind of you.” Sarcasm tasted raw on her tongue, but Penelope was smiling. Any pity the princess had brought down into the cells with her was gone, and thoughts of the leg of lamb wrapped in wax paper were growing more and more appealing. Once Josie had gone, Penelope decided, she would eat. She would eat and tear the wax paper to shreds lest the captain and her men notice something in her cell that should not have been there.

And she would do everything in her power not to think of the princess as anything other than a woman who fed her out of pity.

…

When Kaleb took Lizzie to the armory to check up on her latest commission — a shortsword etched with the image of flames — Jade pulled Emma aside and dropped her voice.

“You drew a single card for the assassin, not three,” she said. “I want to know why.”

Emma looked around. The throne room was otherwise vacant, but the palace had its own way of listening in. “I snuck down and read her after she spoke with Lizzie,” said Emma, shaking her head. “One card for her, one card for her fate, and one for the result.”

“Well?”

“The Moon.” Emma paused, uneasy. “The Star, and The Tower.”

Jade bristled. Her lips twitched.

There was only one person in the palace for whom the card of The Star had ever been named.

“You mean to tell me—”

“ _Yes_ ,” interrupted Emma. “They’re written in the cards. The Star will be her fate and there’s not a thing we can do to stop it.”

Much to consider, thought Jade, and none of it good. It was almost too much with her whirling thoughts to catch hold of. The gears turning in her head picked up speed with each passing second. At present there was only one thing she knew for sure.

“Not a word of this to Lizzie,” she decided, fishing a smoke from the tin case in her boot. She lit it with a match and sagged against the stone wall. “She catches wind and we’ll all blow over.”

“Agreed,” said Emma.

“What does Kaleb know?”

“Not a thing, Your Grace.”

“I’ll thank you to keep it that way.”

Emma nodded. “Jade.”

Jade lifted her chin. “Emma.”

She was unused to keeping secrets from her wife, the last having been revealed years ago, the one to do with her parentage, but this was a far more dire situation. In Jade’s opinion, at least.

Besides, there was a first time for everything.


	6. v.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The queen puts faith in the hands of her First Gentleman, the princess and the assassin discuss fate, and the princess takes what she’s learned to the most knowledgeable and objective man in the palace.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello. i am very tired. enjoy this.

“You did _what_?” Jade did not sound upset, nor did she look it, but Lizzie saw clearly the surprise on her face. And for good reason. 

“I sent him to see his brother,” said Lizzie again. “Perhaps he can talk some sense into Lord Kirby. At the very least I pray he returns with some answers.”

Jade blew out a breath.

Two years it had been since Rafael last left the queen and her wife on their lonesome for more than a week at a time, and those were only hunting trips or philanthropic visits to the outer territories. This trip to the Young Lords’ land would take a month at the very least, and that was counting on Rafael’s success at keeping his brother level-headed. Although the First Gentleman was an excellent diplomat, Lord Kirby was volatile. Lizzie would pray, too, that sending him on the road would not prove catastrophic.

“I’d say I hope you know what you’re doing,” said Jade, “but I have yet to see you fail at anything you put your heart into.”

“Everything I have done as queen has been with you beside me,” said Lizzie. “Much of the credit is yours.”

Flames crackled and spit in the fireplace on the north wall of the queen’s quarters. Jade’s blood ran hot by nature and she did not love the extra heat, but Lizzie ran cold and Jade loved her queen.

“Don’t want the credit,” she said, sinking down beside Lizzie on the settee before the fire.

Color from the flames danced about the queen’s hair and cast shadows across fair skin and painted her in a light unmatched by all but the sun. Without a crown, with her hair loose and down, wearing only a linen nightdress and a wool robe, Jade thought she’d never seen a finer queen. That the only other queen she’d spent time around otherwise was her father’s wife meant nothing. Lizzie, however, meant everything.

“What do you want then?” Lizzie reached for Jade’s hand and stroked her knuckles, cradling it in both of her own.

“To live and die by your side.”

“Those were your vows on the day we wed, were they not?”

Jade nodded. “And their truth grows stronger each day.”

… 

“What does it mean?”

“What’s that?” said Josie, eyeing Penelope through iron bars.

“The cards,” said Penelope.

The silent hour, as she’d begun to think of it, was not so silent any longer. Hadn’t been for four days now, if she counted correctly. With no windows to allow daylight into the dungeon, days and nights had become a concept of novelty to the assassin. She was grateful to still have her head.

“You know,” Penelope went on, “The _Moon_ , the…whatever else. The seer called me The Moon. What does that mean?”

“Depends on who you ask,” said Josie, though by the way she bit her cheek and looked at her hands it seemed she had much more to say.

So, “I’m asking you,” said Penelope.

Josie fell silent.

It was common to speak and never be spoken to in the Young Lords’ territory, but Josie was nothing like Clarke and Kirby. Josie was not cruel, nor was she self-obsessed, or power hungry. Penelope knew Josie to be curious, genuine, and kind, but she had met her only a few days before and thus her guard was still raised as high as she could manage. Josie was, after all, still a royal of Mystic Falls.

“The Moon is an important card,” said Josie after a moment. “I know it to mean that things are not as they seem.”

“Ah.”

“It has much to do with intuition,” said Josie. “The Moon tells you that a person — or a situation, even — is not what it appears to be, and to trust your instincts. It tells you that whatever you feel for that person in your gut is the feeling you should follow.”

Penelope did not want to apply such a meaning to herself. Fact was she rode in to kill, had failed, and was to be put to death. As far as she saw everything _was_ as it seemed, notwithstanding her former debt to the Young Lords. She did not want to be anything other than an unsuccessful assassin.

“With all due respect, princess,” said Penelope, “fuck The Moon.”

Josie smiled, to Penelope’s surprise. “An assassin speaking ill of fate. I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“ _Your fate_ ,” Penelope remembered the seer stating before drawing her second card. But not before the royals, no, only one card had been drawn for her then. One was all they needed, the seer told the queen. The night before that, deep in the dungeons, swathed in shadows of the night, her opinion had been different.

“We are the architects of our own fate,” said Penelope.

“Wait.” Josie frowned then and fixed her with a look that could not go unanswered. Their eyes met, but Penelope wished they hadn’t. “Emma didn’t read for your fate. Or the result.”

“She did. In secret.” Penelope slouched against the stone wall, tipped her head back against it, and looked at Josie with what felt an awful lot like admiration. Curiosity bred observance, she knew, and thought highly of it. “Told me it could mean certain death for me if I spoke of it.”

But the queen was going to execute her either way, she knew, too. Her fate was already sealed, like it or not, and she was in no position to bargain for her life.

With each day that passed Penelope grew more and more accepting of the imminence of her death at the hand of the crown. She was, however, no longer certain she deserved it. But that hardly mattered.

“You’re already going to die,” said Josie sadly, like she was right there in Penelope’s head. “So why not tell just me. What did the cards have to say of your fate?”

“As I am The Moon, apparently,” said Penelope with a small smile, twirling a finger toward the sky, “my fate is The Star.”

Josie froze. Her eyes went wide. Her face paled, and she shot to her feet.

“I have to go.”

“Wait—”

But the princess was already gone.

And Penelope was left with more questions than she wanted answers for.

…

“You know I question the validity of the cards,” said Dorian when Josie sought him out in the library.

Exactly, she thought. That’s why she brought this to him instead of to MG, in hopes that he could convince her it did not have to mean anything.

“You’re the only one in the palace who sees them objectively,” said Josie.

Dorian considered this a moment. “What’s plaguing your mind? I assume it has to do with the assassin. ‘The Moon,’ as Emma’s read.”

“Her fate is The Star,” said Josie quietly, looking at her clasped hands and trying not to fidget. “And my sister does not know.” With those words she hoped, prayed, Dorian would understand her plight.

The librarian was as loyal to Lizzie as he had been to Alaric years ago and some part of Josie questioned whether his loyalty reached all those with the Saltzman name or just those upon the throne. She brushed the thought away as quickly as she could; Dorian was a good man, solid, and unwavering in his character. To question whether he was as loyal to her as he was to Lizzie was unfair. In the kingdom of Mystic Falls the queen always came first.

“And you don’t want me to tell her,” said Dorian, rubbing the stubble on his chin. “That’s a lot to ask of me.”

“I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important.”

“I know.”

“Give me until the execution,” Josie decided. “If I haven’t figured out what this means by then, I’ll tell Lizzie myself.”

“I can do that.”

Josie smiled, if sadly. She hadn’t the faintest idea where to begin with The Moon and The Star.

“If there is one thing I do believe the cards have gotten right,” said Dorian with reluctant pride, “it’s you. The Star is full of hope, so they say. It carries motivation for freedom and stability.”

“I’m quite familiar,” said Josie. Her smile no longer felt sad.

“You are all of those things in droves. I would not put my faith in any other Star.”

It was precisely what she needed to hear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i can be found on twitter @jackassdotjpg if u wanna talk or square up or whatever


	7. vi.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The queen readies for a grand display of violence, the First Daughter nears the capital city, and the princess scrambles for a plan. Execution day, pt. I.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and we're back. this is (sort of?) a filler chapter bc a) i just got out of rehab, b) if i don't post this now i'm never going to, and c) if you yell at me to keep writing this fuckin thing it might just happen. godspeed.

“Today.”

A single word was all it took to fill the empty library.

Josie’s throat closed, her heart clenched, and she sank to the stone hearth in hopes the crackling fire would comfort the chill rising up within her.

There was, it seemed, no method to her sister’s madness. Certainly there was no formal scheduling for anything less than receiving noble guests, formal being more than a few hours notice. Things such as feasts, hunts, and executions announced the morning of were common under Lizzie’s rule. The people of Mystic falls were well accustomed to their queen’s penchant for unpredictability.

“Today?” said Josie, confidence lacking in her voice. “You’re sure?”

“She’s already sent riders as far as the farmlands,” said Dorian. “High noon, so I hear.”

“High noon,” echoed Josie.

She knew not why the impending death of the assassin rested so heavily on her shoulders. A month since Penelope was caught; a month since Lizzie declared she must die. One month was not enough time for Josie to figure out why she cared so to begin with.

Because did not, perhaps, or because the termination of human life was far too ordinary in a kingdom that was otherwise at peace. Because she had snuck around and forged a bond with Penelope. Because she was kind, and Penelope was compelling, and was still hiding things, and Josie longed to know more of the reasons she wound up in debt to Clarke and Kirby.

“I’ll tell her,” said Josie, thinking finally of the promise she’d made Dorian. “I  _ will  _ make this right.”

The sun had yet to rise. There was still time.

…

“ _ That  _ is your plan? Simply to ride into the kingdom like not a day has passed?”

Hope nodded.

“That’s not much of a plan at all,” said Rebekah.

She was right, and it wasn’t, not really, but if there was anything in which Hope was confident it was her knowledge of the standard operating procedures of Mystic Falls. Though she assumed, rightfully so, that Lizzie had made changes since her coronation. But she knew Lizzie, they were once close, and Hope’s faith in her knowledge of her sister was far stronger than in what she knew of the kingdom.

“Precisely,” said Hope, and grinned. “We’ll bring shock to the commonwealth. And to Lizzie.”

“The simplest plan is often the wisest,” said Marcel.

“All right,” said Rebekah after a moment. “You shall have your way.”

As if there were any other option.

…

“You’re interrupting my morning routine,” said Lizzie over a glass of wine as Josie entered her bedchamber. “I have a system. It’s very precise.”

“To hell with your system,” said Josie, calmer than she’d dared to hope. “I know what you’re doing.”

Jade stirred beneath the sheets of the queen’s bed and, recognizing the voices, pulled a feather pillow over her head.

“You always drink before breakfast when you’re going to kill someone,” said Josie. “It’s execution day, isn’t it?”

The sun began to inch over the horizon, painting the room technicolor through the stained glass window above the bed. 

Lizzie sighed. “I hunt the night before, too. And I don’t sleep. We’ll feast tonight.”

This, Josie could see in the relaxed brow of her sister, and in the twinkle of excitement and unfettered power in her eyes, was going to be harder than she’d like.

Josie did not want to feast. Nor did she want to fight. One or the other, it must be, and the decision was entirely her own. Save, of course, for the dreaded possibility of  _ both _ .

Heaven only knew why she imagined Lizzie would receive her gently, listen to her plea with open ears, and consider her wishes as one who loves another should. Her sister was lenient in personal matters but hardened steel where the reputation of the kingdom teetered on the line. Fleeting hope was all Josie had to hold onto. Even that had begun to dwindle.

Worst of all?

“You don’t have to do this,” said Josie, wringing her hands. “But you  _ want _ to.”

If only she could convince her sister that this  _ was _ a personal matter.

Lizzie crossed to the table by the window, the little one that always held a jug of wine and a cask of rum. Beside it a rolling table sat carrying loaves of bread, cheese, and a dish of sliced sausage. “Of course I do,” said Lizzie, turning her back to her sister while she poured another glass of wine. “The Queen never does anything she doesn’t wish to do.”

…

Hope Mikaelson and the Originals rode into Mystic Falls shortly after first light on the morning the assassin was to be put to death.

Birds sang, leaves whispered and giggled in the wind, and the kingdom was peaceful.

“You’re certain about this?” asked Rebekah as the party—barely fifteen strong—approached the town wall, the final barrier between them and the palace.

Hope was more than certain. She was determined, filled with a blinding anticipation that caked her bones in adrenaline and made her feel as if she rode on air. The Queen of the Wastelands had not felt so alive in years.

“Yes,” said Hope. She looked to her aunt and grinned, wide and wild.

For the first time in nine-some years, the First Daughter pressed on into the heart of the capital city of Mystic Falls.

… 

Dejected.

Disappointed.

Downcast.

_ Add them up _ , thought Josie,  _ and a woman’s determination becomes dangerous _ .

She leaned limp against a wall in the grand stone hallway leading from Lizzie’s bedchamber to the library, trying and failing to formulate a plan that would not put her in her sister’s line of fire for decades to come. Each time she came up empty. Or came up with wicked visions of Lizzie despising her until death for throwing a wrench in her plans.

Lizzie was petty that way, unfortunately, and the thought of a lifelong grudge was not something Josie cared much to entertain.

It was—

“ _ Oh God, seven Hells _ ,” a distant voice rang out, growing louder as heavy footsteps thundered against marble floors. “ _ Shit _ .” The clash of a sword against stone wrenched Josie from her thoughts in time to see Kaleb crash around the corner in a sprint. Josie was unsure she’d ever heard him curse before. His sword, hung from a loop on his belt, swung wildly as he ran and, jingling against the hilt, dangled a set of keys. It was then that a questionable beginning of an incredibly stupid plan came to her.

Before she could talk herself out of it, as Kaleb drew closer, shouting for the queen, Josie pushed away from the wall and put herself directly in his path.

They collided with a thud.

Kaleb’s hands went to her shoulders, righting her, though she needed no steadying, and a worried look crossed his eyes. “Are you all right? Have I hurt you?” he asked, his gaze jumping over her shoulder to the empty hallway beyond.

“No.” She shook her head. “I—”

“I’m sorry, Josie, but I need—”

“Lizzie, I know,” said Josie, tucking her hands behind her back. “Go.”

With that he was gone.

In the palm of a hand reddened from clenching and clammy from jittery nerves sat a weathered set of keys.

And with that?

Josie ran.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh wow i wonder wtf is gonna happen


	8. vii.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The princess thwarts the queen's plans. Execution day, pt. II.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> been hitting myself over the head for taking so long on this chapter, so hopefully it isn't total ass. was originally going to take care of execution day in two parts but figured it'd be more fun to draw it out and keep you hanging :) i did not edit this as i am at work and am not supposed to be using the company computer for things like fanfiction (though i wouldn't have edited it even if i was on my laptop at home). let me know what ya think.

Approaching the gate thrilled the Queen of the Wastelands.

Stationed on either side of the wrought iron monstrosity was a guard in the red and black garb of the Saltzman Crown. Hope raised a hand and her riders stopped. Atop the dappled gray Shire, scarf tied over her nose and mouth, auburn hair loose and wild in the wind, Hope supposed she looked rather like a cutthroat. Good.

“State your business,” called the larger of the guards.

“An audience with the queen,” said Hope. Her horse took her a step closer. “If you’d be so kind.”

“Turn back the way you came.” The guard scoffed. “My queen does not entertain goons.”

Hope pulled down her scarf. The wicked grin she wore beneath it was one she stole from Rebekah ages ago, one she’d spent years perfecting. The horse took three steps further. Hope’s eyes twinkled with mischief. “Say that again,” she said. “I dare you.”

A sharp intake of breath, and, “You—you’re  _ dead _ .”

“Is that so?” Hope Mikaelson fixed the gawking guard with a raised brow. “And who’s supposed to have killed me?”

“I’m not—I don’t—”

“Alert the palace,” said Hope, easing her horse closer toward the town gates. The guard backed away as she neared. Good, she thought. “Tell the queen her sister is home.”

… 

The dungeon was still cold, but Penelope Park was long used to it.

Days—weeks?—ago she ceased counting the days; tick marks scratched into the dirt beside the spot where she slept stopped at eleven. The ones by the door, however, numbered six and counting.

The brand was healing. Slowly, but it was healing. The princess had brought her boiled water and laundered cloth to clean and wrap it. She could now stand without reverberating pain, however she figured her walk would carry a cautious limp until the thing completely scarred over. Bearing the wound itself was easier than telling the princess of its existence. 

Despite her track record Penelope did not like being the bearer of bad news. 

_ “I changed my mind. I’m going to push.” _

_ “Is that right?” _

_ “You’re  _ **_hurt_ ** _.” _

_ “I’ve had worse.” _

_ “That’s no excuse,” said Josie. Her hands closed around the bars that kept the assassin in. She looked rather hurt herself; worry sat on her brow, the corners of her mouth turned down, and Penelope thought she looked like a wounded wolf cub. “Show me.” _

_ Penelope looked at Josie from her spot on the floor. Looked at her and sighed, knowing deflection was easier. Easier, perhaps, but awfully tiring. How long could she go on insisting that the pain in her leg was not worth worrying about? That she’d convinced herself as much mere hours after the act did not say much. From a young age she was taught to minimize her pain, to power through it, because there were always things more important than whatever plagued her. Things like work in the stables, the house—all of it. Chores when she was young, indentured servitude as she grew older. _

_ “It’s nothing,” she insisted without heart. _

_ “If you’re hurt,” said Josie, gently as one would approach an unfamiliar animal, “I can help you. But you need to show me.” _

_ Two options presented themselves. _

_ To die bitter or to die vulnerable. _

_ Neither, thought Penelope, was preferable. Both were quite shameful, in fact, though she knew which her parents would choose. That thought alone was enough to make the decision for her. _

_ Her parents fled with fear all those years ago, leaving nothing behind but a shattered household and a terrified child. There was no vulnerability in their abandonment, for vulnerability called upon strength, and their desertion was born of weakness. _

_ “Promise me something first,” said Penelope, however little she believed she deserved a vow. _

_ Josie nodded. _

_ “Don’t make a fuss,” she said. “Don’t go angrily to the queen. Just—don’t.” _

_ “Penelope.” _

_ She hated how nice her name sounded off of Josie’s lips. _

_ “Josette,” she said, daring a smile. _

_ “Fine,” said Josie, rolling her eyes. “Show me.” _

_ Vulnerability, Penelope reminded herself, was a marker of courage. The brand on her thigh was little more than the mark of a scared royal. _

_ She sunk down by the door and on the other side Josie sat with her. If she reached out, through the bars, she could take Josie’s hand. She could touch her face and thank her for all the times she visited the dungeon to see her, the woman who rode in to kill the queen. To kill her sister. Penelope doubted she could articulate a gratitude such as that, certainly not after all she had done. _

_ “So this…” Penelope could not finish the sentence. Tentatively she peeled back the fraying layer of her torn trousers. The healing process had barely begun; dried blood ringed the mark, coarse and unforgiving in appearance, and the skin around it flared red with its effort to surrender to infection. It looked better than it had a few days ago. _

_ Josie gasped, words caught in her throat. _

_ “It’s not so bad,” said Penelope, but she couldn’t bear to look at Josie. “Hurts less than before.” _

_ “Who did this?” Her voice was small, unsure and unwilling to believe that anyone she knew could have marked another human so savagely. _

_ Penelope shook her head. The who wasn’t important, not in the grand scheme. She counted thirty long seconds before either of them spoke. _

_ “I’ll get you out of here,” said Josie in a tone that brought the hair on the back of Penelope’s neck to a stand. When she forced her eyes from the floor it was rage she found in Josie’s eyes, a look she never expected to see in the eyes of the princess. “You have my word.” _

_ One’s word meant nothing, thought Penelope, until proven. _

_ No matter the conviction Josie carried.  _

_ The assassin would not allow herself to hope. Not for salvation, and not for rescue.  _

_ No matter how desperately she longed to believe the princess would be her saving grace. _

Penelope hated to think of that day; the way her cheeks burned as she bared her wound, the thunderous beat of her anxious heart as she waited for Josie to speak, the tears she allowed to singe her lips once Josie left her alone. The bitter laugh in the back of her throat as she drew a seventh mark by the door. The overwhelming thought that yes, she was going to die. Her body would fall before the commonwealth and Mystic Falls would return to business as usual. The way she wished the queen would, for once in her life, set a date with ample notice so that she may force herself to accept the fact of her imminent death.

Because, whether she understood it or not, however many times Penelope insisted she was at peace with her fate it was little more than a lie shrouded in hope. A childish sort of hope that even in death nothing truly sinister might happen to her. Stories her mother told her as a child of benevolent spirits frolicking among the living, witches communing with late ancestors by way of love and longing, and the indestructibility of the human soul rose to her mind night after night as she struggled to find sleep on the stone floor. 

Perhaps, she hoped, her soul might find peace among people. Perhaps there would be no pain in death. Perhaps, even, she would be happy.

Such were the thoughts that turned her head to the wall and sunk her teeth into her arm lest the guards hear her crying and taunt her all the more.

It was not worth the grief, Penelope thought just before the noise, for the legacy of Elizabeth Saltzman left no room for hope.

… 

“Lizzie.”

That name in that voice. It had been quite a while, but Lizzie needn’t turn around to know the call of her First Officer. Her attention remained elsewhere at the moment, namely with the bread dipped in honey to signify a sweet morning. Beheadings always called for extra sweets.

“You’re supposed to be setting the stage in the square,” said Lizzie. Her eye drifted to the cask of wine, to her empty cup, and she squared her jaw. “Is  _ everyone _ hell-bent on distrusting my preparations this morning?”

“Your Grace,” said Kaleb, his voice hard as rock. “There’s been a message from the wall.”

“Which wall?”

“Your Grace?”

“ _ Which _ wall, Kaleb?” Lizzie rounded on him. A fire lit in her eyes. Bread and honey forgotten. She had a plan, one that was not up for negotiation, one that would not be stalled by any message. From either wall. She’d have Kaleb locked in the dungeons for the day if it meant her plan would go off without another hitch. “The big one? The important one? Or do you mean to tell me you’re in my way this morning with word from the  _ town  _ wall? The ugliest remnant of architecture left over from my father’s reign? The wall a child could knock down with a toy sword?”

“ _ Lizzie _ ,” said Kaleb desperately. “It’s Hope. She’s here.”

“Oh,” said Lizzie. Anger fled from her eyes, replaced with bewilderment, and the blood in her veins stilled. “Oh, for  _ fuck’s _ sake.”

… 

When the noise came Penelope was certain it was time to meet her maker. If the queen kept her locked up any longer the people of the kingdom would lose interest in her execution. It must be time. 

The noise came once—a deafening clang of metal against stone, the thud of something heavy knocked over.

The noise came again, this time with an anguished human cry.

When the noise came for a third time Penelope was on her feet, hands balled to fists at her sides, chin raised in a display of pride that she planned to take to the grave.

Footsteps sounded down the tunnel, lighter than those of the guards, and for a moment Penelope was lost. She knew those footsteps. And she knew the figure that rounded the corner despite the hooded cloak she wore. What Penelope didn’t know, however, was what she was doing in the dungeon. It was hours away from the silent hour they so often shared, but here she was.

“Can you run?” asked Josie, pushing the hood back enough for the dim light to catch her face.

“What are you—”

“Can you _ run _ ?”

“Can —yes,” said Penelope. The urgency in Josie’s face quieted her questions. “I can run.”

A rusty click. The door to her cell swung open. 

For the first time Penelope looked clearly at the princess. Not through bars. Not in a portrait hung in the Young Lords’ mansion. In the flesh, unimpeded. And she was  _ beautiful _ . Even with eyes wide with fear and adrenaline. Penelope thought of the first time they met and once again swore that no portrait would ever do her justice. No painting could capture the grace in the blink of those lashes, or the passion in her eyes. No artist was capable of truly immortalizing the wonder of a living, breathing human. And certainly not this one. She was far too—breathtaking.

“What’s—”

“No time,” said Josie, taking her by the arm and hauling her out of the cell to much protest by her wounded leg. “The guards will be back on their feet any second now. We’ve got to  _ move _ .”

“ _ Jo! _ ”

Penelope stopped in her tracks just outside of the cell; the new voice, young and insistent, was not a familiar one. It sounded worried, almost shameful, like the man it came from was not where he was supposed to be. All she could do was follow Josie through the tunnel that led up to the palace.

“ _ Josie, you gotta go  _ **_now_ ** ,” called the voice.

They rounded a corner. Standing in an archway was a man not much older than herself. A mounted lamp shone light at his back, casting his outline in a yellow glow. With both hands he held a wooden club and, as the girls drew near, Penelope saw his eyes were wide and worried.

“You gotta go,” he said again. It sounded this time quite like a plea.

They reached the archway.

“Thank you, MG,” said Josie. She reached for his shoulder and he softened, just barely, though the worry did not leave his eyes.

“Go,” he insisted. “I need to get back to my alibi, and you need to hurry.”

“Ali—” on the other side of the archway two guards lay haphazardly on the stone floor, one slumped atop the other “—bi?” The question died on Penelope’s tongue.

Josie nodded.

MG looked at the unconscious men. He dropped the club, steeled himself with a roll of the shoulders and a sharp breath, and took off back to the palace.

Penelope caught herself watching him go. And smiling. “I like him,” she said.

Josie lifted a finger to her lips. “The walls have ears,” she murmured.

To their left loomed a wall. Josie knelt before it and with all her might pushed a stone at the very bottom. To Penelope’s surprise it slid backward and the wall gave way, swinging inward on invisible hinges to reveal a deep corridor of blackness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if u made it this far you get a gold star


	9. viii.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The First Daughter reuinites with the queen. The princess and the assassin flee to an old familiar home. Two of them show a bit of vulnerability. Execution day, pt. III.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i tried. but i didn't edit. please yell at me if you are so inclined. godspeed.

It seemed all of Mystic Falls was on the streets to witness the wonder.

The homecoming.

Men and women lined the dirt road leading to the palace, their faces cautious but curious, and Hope saw among them disbelief as she rode by. They did not know what to do with the revelation, she presumed, that the First Daughter was not at all dead. She guessed they wondered what would come of the Saltzaman throne. Though she would not address the commonwealth on horseback at present, Hope planned to reassure the kingdom that she had no intention of taking the crown.

Not now that she had one of her very own.

The palace rose before the riding party with all the grace of a lumbering giant, albeit one with some degree of poise and class. Archers stood behind parapets atop the twin towers flanking the gatehouse. Its stone facade and stained glass windows boasted elegance and the promise of a courageous ruler.

Hope was both of those things, but she was no Saltzman. The essence of her bloodline could not be traced through the royals of Mystic Falls and, petty as it was, this would mean a great deal to the people should they ever become the wiser. She had no legal right to the throne she was once raised to assume.

Bannermen stood astride the gatehouse toting the red and black banners of the kingdom.

A lone man stood directly before the gate and, though much time had passed, Hope recognized him instantly. It would be a cold day in hell before she forgot the face of Kaleb Hawkins.

…

“Are you ready for this?”

Jade was dressed in a brocade doublet of red velvet, the stallion of Mystic Falls embroidered at her back in black thread, and matching black trousers with red piping tucked into leather boots. She looked the very picture of royalty, but Lizzie knew better than anyone that she would rather be in common cotton and twill.

“No,” admitted Lizzie. 

Jed burst through the door just as Jade finished fastening the sable fur mantle around Lizzie’s shoulders.

“Your Majesty.”

Kaleb had been sent to usher Hope and her party into the palace, leaving Jed the next highest ranking officer on the grounds. When Lizzie rounded on him with a wicked scowl she saw his bruised and blackening cheek, his bloodied nose, and the shame set heavy within his eyes.

“You bring bad news,” she said. “Going by the state of you.”

“They’re gone,” said Jed without hesitation. “The both of them.”

To call this another crack in Lizzie’s plan was akin to calling a butter knife a longsword. Cracks— _canyons_ —were forming at every edge, it seemed, and if Lizzie believed in the gods she’d call this day a curse from the heavens. She turned without a word to pour herself a cup of wine, the sovereign's cloak swishing soundlessly behind her.

“Who is _they_ , Jed?” said Jade, looking worriedly after her wife.

“The assassin,” said Jed, “and the princess.”

… 

Penelope was tired. Both her mind and her muscles cried out for rest.

Fighting sleep on horseback, however, was not ideal. Between the uneven terrain—no main roads, Josie said, not until they breached the town wall—and the urgency of the ride there was little to keep Penelope grounded other than the hold she had on Josie.

“Hold on,” she’d said as they tore away from the palace atop a chestnut warmblood, “and stay sharp.”

Penelope did not stay sharp. 

The first few miles of their journey she spent wishing the trees would not rush by in a nauseating blur, but she did not ask the princess to slow the horse.

She could not remember the last time she ate, nor could she recall when she was last properly hydrated. Nausea and dizziness were to be expected of someone so depleted and deprived. Josie, she hoped, would make sure she ate and drank whenever they reached their final destination.

Wherever that may be.

They passed unlit woodland homes, barns unattended save for meandering cattle, an old sealed well, a crumbling staircase leading into the damp earth. Penelope watched it all pass her by with half-lidded eyes; it wasn’t until they were miles out of the palace that she realized just how drained she was. With the adrenaline of the escape long left behind her there was little more she could do than pray she would not fall into unconsciousness and from the horse.

… 

Cast iron gates came thudding to a close behind Hope. She slid from her horse, stroking its muzzle as she settled her weight on her feet.

“You were dead,” said a familiar voice, and a warm body crashed into Hope. Strong arms circled her shoulders and held her close.

“I was never dead,” said Hope with a sad little laugh, clinging to Kaleb as he clung to her. “Missing, maybe.”

Kaleb stood back and held her by the shoulders. His expression stalled somewhere between joy and disbelief, like this was magic and he had been a skeptic.

“What happened?”

“Long story,” said Hope. “Take me to my sister first, would you?”

Kaleb did not lead her to the throne room as she expected, but instead to the room in which Alaric used to hold council. The large oak table remained, the chairs circling it were the same as they’d been nine years ago. For what it was worth, the room looked untouched. It was smaller than most rooms in the palace—Alaric’s council had been minuscule—its little balcony looked out over the training grounds, and there was far less room for fuss. And not enough room for Hope’s entire party to join the reunion.

She’d brought none of them along, anyhow. Guards had put them up in the guest hall where Hope was certain they would find entertainment in luxury. For now she needed a private audience with Lizzie.

A knock sounded and Hope rose to her feet.

The door creaked open.

… 

“What is this place?”

The house was big, sprawled out across nearly as much land as housed the palace. No lights shone through the windows, no life called out from within. As they drew near on horseback Penelope noticed the thick rusted chain looped through the door handle and anchored to the frame by a large bolt.

It was deserted but not yet desolate. The brick held its color, the paint barely chipped. The house was beautiful. And haunting.

“It belonged to two brothers my father considered family,” said Josie, leading the horse around back of the building. She looked wistfully at dark windows. “We chained the doors the same day we buried them. My father was selfish in his sentimentality.”

“Royals are allowed their proclivities,” said Penelope.

Atop the horse they were forced to sit close; Penelope’s chest against Josie’s back, the uneven terrain and the four-beat gait of the mount jostling their bodies together incessantly. Her arms looped loosely around Josie’s middle, just enough to keep herself steady, though she wished their closeness were under different circumstances.

At least she no longer felt as if at any moment she might lose focus to unconsciousness.

But she was sure she smelled, a month in a cell would do that to you, and the dull throb in her leg was a constant distraction. Her hair was wild with its waves and wouldn’t stop blowing in her face with each whip of the wind. Things she’d never thought to think of before—the mess of her hair, the dirt on her face, the tears in her clothes—pushed her towards insecurity, and she was unsure how to push back. She wanted off of that horse. She wanted back on her feet, where she was comfortable, where she could control the flow of motion. On her feet she needn’t go anywhere her mind didn’t wish to take her; on horseback she was trapped until Josie decided it was time to dismount. She had been confined to small quarters for so long, now freedom was so nearly in her grasp, and she wished to reach out and take it in a vise grip.

A stone patio stretched out behind the house. In its heyday it might have been home to feasts at sunset, talks of philosophy come midnight, debates of war should the company permit. Penelope could almost see, then and there, the beautiful people who visited this place before its doors shut for good. Something fluttered in her stomach and she thought momentarily that if she were born in another time she, too, may have attended parties at a place such as this. 

If only.

“Why are we here?”

At the edge of the patio they stopped. Josie stroked the horse's mane and exhaled heavily. Her fingers lingered on its chestnut coat as she eyed the house.

“This is a safe house,” she said. “It’s protected under a treaty, no one touches this land.” Josie dismounted slowly, taking care not to knock Penelope as she swung her leg over, and held out a hand.

A hand which Penelope did not want to take. She should be able to dismount on her own; that’s what she was raised to do—everything on her own, by herself, never with any help. To ask assistance was not shameful, no, but it was less honorable.

She shifted in the saddle, testing her leg, finding it stiff and sore. She grit her teeth and took Josie’s hand, hauling herself off of the horse.

“You’re sure it’s safe?” She did not let go of Josie’s hand, not yet. Not when she was in unfamiliar land and the hand she held belonged to the last familiar thing she had left. “No hidden dangers?”

Josie laughed and, though unexpected, it was the sweetest sound Penelope had heard in years.

“I have the only key,” said Josie, eyes twinkling. Her thumb twitched against Penelope’s hand, an unintentional caress. “So unless you fear me, there are no dangers to speak of.”

Never, thought Penelope. “Then this is the safest place I’ve been since childhood,” she said.

… 

“Lizzie.”

“Hope.”

“You don’t look all that surprised to see me,” said Hope.

 _Because I’m not_ , thought Lizzie, and then thought better of it. “I’m _happy_ to see you,” she said instead. One step closer and she stood face-to-face with the sister she lost nine years ago. The sister who, until the assassin rolled into town and began digging up old Saltzman family business, Lizzie did indeed believe to be dead. Looking at her now, in the flesh, was odd, like passing a portrait in the corridor and looking back because you’re certain the eyes will have followed you.

Hope’s mouth twitched at the corner, the hint of a smile.

Nine years was not the end of the world. There was time to make up for, pleasantries to eventually be had, but in the moment then all Lizzie could muster was a comforting feeling that she no longer had to do any of this alone.

Yes, she had advisors. Officers. Friends, even. But none of them knew the burden of the crown, none of them could truly say what it meant to have the fate of the kingdom rest in their hands. Not one of them knew the pressures Lizzie bestowed upon herself the moment she took up the mantle of ruler.

Neither did Hope, Lizzie thought, but she knew enough. She’d always been Alaric’s favorite. 

She didn’t remember reaching for Hope’s hand, but there it was. Warm against her palm, another comfort, especially as Hope squeezed.

“You, too,” said Hope. “But happy is perhaps too small a word.”

“Screw it.” Lizzie pulled Hope into her arms. She smiled, and there might’ve been tears. “Screw it all. None of it matters.” _And_ she might have been thinking aloud.

“I assume you’re talking about the assassin,” said Hope. “And the execution.”

“You know about that? How?”

“I don’t live under a rock, you know.”

And so they sat, one beside the other, and talked. And it was oddly normal. Old speech patterns were still there, Lizzie still spoke more than Hope, and Hope still listened more intently than Lizzie could ever teach herself to do.

It reminded them both of why they got on so well in their youth—Hope gave when Lizzie pulled, and Lizzie pushed when Hope stood still. Complementary was the perfect word. Like two halves of a whole they fit together. Each empty space that one possessed the other filled without conscious effort.

Lizzie told Hope of the kingdom in their father’s absence, how assuming the throne was not something Lizzie initially wanted to do. How Josie convinced her it was the right thing to do, the _only_ thing to do given the predicament. Lizzie spoke of Jade, of their marriage, though tentatively at first, and openly once Hope assured her that she and Jade had been little more than a political arrangement. She spoke of Raf, of Kaleb, Jed.

Mystic Falls was doing fine, she assured Hope, though Lizzie did not believe she personally had anything to do with it. The kingdom ran as smoothly as it did under their father, and the kingdom itself was to thank for that. Not the queen. The queen, said Lizzie, sat upon a throne and barked orders that were often more ceremonial than they were legally binding. Or so it felt. 

Assuming the throne was not a mistake, Lizzie decided aloud eventually, and she loved Mystic Falls, and loved her people, but—

“The crown is heavy,” said Hope, and her mouth pressed into a knowing smirk. “Heavier than you thought?”

It did not cross Lizzie’s mind that she was sharing things with Hope that she hadn’t shared with anyone else, and Hope had barely been back an hour. 

“ _Exactly_ ,” said Lizzie. Even as she spoke of her stressors it was not enough to deter the new life that flooded her system the moment she walked through that door to face the lost sister returned. “I don’t know why I’m telling you all of this,” she went on, shaking her head. “It isn’t like _you’re_ the queen of anything.”

“Actually,” said Hope, “ _technically_ I am.”

“You don’t mean—”

“Relax,” said Hope, reaching for Lizzie’s hand. “I’m not here for your throne. I have my own. Although I don’t rule a kingdom.”

Whatever that meant. “Explain,” said Lizzie.

“I rule a people,” said Hope, and her voice began to slow, just noticeably, enough to be cautious, and for the first time since sitting down together she closed her eyes off to Lizzie. “We call ourselves the Originals.”

Lizzie blinked. Her mouth opened as if to speak, then closed.

There was only one group of people to ever assert ownership of that name in Mystic Falls. The day they’d struck had already been written in the history books; 

There was only one group of people to ever assert ownership of that name in Mystic Falls. The day they’d struck had already been written in the history books. It was a day of sorrow, of remembrance, when the commonwealth took to the streets and rung bells for the former king. The king who fell, that day, nine years ago, when his home was raided by a very specific people.

“The people who attacked the day Dad died,” said Lizzie, and slumped back in her chair. “You’re with _them_?”

“My father is dead, that much—”

“ _Your_ father?”

“Yours is dead, too,” said Hope.

“ _Too_ ? And that’s supposed to mean _what_?”

Hope squared her jaw, and finally her eyes began to soften. And when she spoke it was with delicacy, Lizzie supposed, because Hope of all people knew what the wrong delivery of words could do to the reigning Queen of Mystic Falls.

“Alaric Saltzman,” said Hope, “was not my father.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> love u :)


End file.
